


think, long and hard.

by y9gurt (rydellon)



Series: everything is going (burning thin) [1]
Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Angst, Dream SMP Spoilers, Gen, implied suicidal ideation, someone give tommyinnit a hug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-06
Updated: 2020-12-06
Packaged: 2021-03-09 17:54:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,281
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27910339
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rydellon/pseuds/y9gurt
Summary: He had noticed a decrease in use of the main nether portal of the server.
Relationships: No Romantic Relationship(s), Ranboo & TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Sam | Awesamdude & TommyInnit, Toby Smith | Tubbo & TommyInnit
Series: everything is going (burning thin) [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2043784
Comments: 21
Kudos: 693
Collections: Completed stories I've read





	think, long and hard.

**Author's Note:**

> idek what this is. uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh i didnt beta it and its 1am and i might hate this in the morning. take it ily you all
> 
> title from me inside of me from heathers it was the first song on shuffle lol

Tommy is sitting on the blackstone bridge leading to the main nether hub portal.

The nether around it is quite nice, beautiful in his eyes even with the random paths and blocks placed by people over the time they'd been on the sever. He doesn’t quite view the nether air as hot anymore, with the amount of time he's been spending in it, hovering around the main portion used by the rest of the server, hoping to catch someone, _something_ coming through the portal, eyes searching desperately for the familiar shimmer that signifies someone stepping through the purple portal.

He knows that if he himself steps through it Dream will somehow know immediately and he’ll be dead (permanently this time) and so he doesn’t even try to walk close, just staying on the solid blackstone bridge, looking out over the vast lakes of lava under him.

Wilbur (Ghostbur? He doesn’t want to keep calling his brother Ghostbur but there's a _Difference_ between the two and he doesn't want to just not make the distinction) had stopped taking a boat back to L’Manburg and the main SMP lands after the first time he did it, claiming that while he didn’t mind boating there that nether travel was just far more efficient. Tommy knew why he’d actually stopped.

He knew that Tommy likes accompanying him to L’Manburg through the nether, and Tommy suspected that Wilbur liked having him there to escort him back to Logstedshire. What Wilbur didn’t know was that Tommy stayed in the nether the whole time he was in L’Manburg. Every single time Tommy dropped him off he would leave with a “I’ll message you when I need a pickup!” and would leave, and Tommy would sit there. Alone, for hours.

This near-constant monitoring had cause him to notice a decrease in use of the main nether portal of the server.

It had been a week since he had started sitting by it and the only people he had seen use it were Wilbur, Sam, and Ranboo. When Sam had come through he had smiled at the sight of Tommy, and had stopped to have a conversation with him for a while before moving on to a ‘little project’ he’s working on in the nether. Before he had gone he had hugged Tommy, and once he was far enough away Tommy had burst into tears.

Sam had been the first solid person to hug him after his exile.

(Ghostbur didn't count because when he hugged Tommy all Tommy could feel was cold. The ghost of his older brother was like a mirage of his former self, and being hugged like him felt like standing in the middle of a light windstorm. Tommy could get more contact wrapping himself in the thin, shitty, scratchy blanket on his cot in Tnret. He didn't like being hugged by Ghostbur.)

Yesterday Ranboo had walked through the portal.

He’d sworn quietly and hit himself on the arm once he’d gone through, mumbling "bad Ranboo" to himself like he’d done something wrong, before his eyes snapped up and locked on Tommy, who was staring straight at him.

“Holy shit,” he’d said.

Tommy had laughed.

“Holy shit, Tommy. _Tommy_ ,” he’d repeated, and then rushed over, sweeping Tommy off of his feet in all of his lanky glory. “I—you…you’re _alive_. Holy shit.”

“I—yeah,” Tommy said, pressing himself into Ranboo’s arms, his forehead into Ranboo’s shoulder. Second corporeal hug in weeks, and like two days after the first one. He was doing great.

“They…Dream told us to stop using the main nether portal, because it was acting up, and I forgot and accidentally went through and honestly it seems fine I don't know why he told us to stop using it but you’re _here_ Tommy holy _shit_!” the taller boy rambled, pulling away to study Tommy’s face and wipe a tear off with a sad smile. “How have you been?"

Tommy stopped, pulling away and taking a step back, closer to the edge of the blackstone path, closer to the drop into lava. Ranboo reached out a hand to pull him closer to him and further away from but Tommy pushed it off.

“Dream…told you to stop using the main nether portal.”

“Yeah, said it was acting up, I was skeptical but Tubbo—” 

“What the fuck? When did he tell you that?”

“Like a week ago, the day after the day after you got exiled. Why?”

“That. That’s the day I started escorting Wilbur to the portal. That’s the day I started spending time around the portal. You’re telling me—” he stopped as to not get choked up over the new lump in his throat. He could feel his eyes starting to burn, because he knew exactly why Dream told people to stop coming to the portal, and he wasn't about to cry over something that man did to him.

“Dream did it so that we purposefully wouldn’t run into you,” Ranboo finished for him, and pulled Tommy into another hug as Tommy processed the fact that Dream had literally sabotaged him from seeing anyone on the server. The man who had been pretending to be his only friend for the past week had literally been outwardly preventing other people from coming to see him. Tommy started shaking, legs and Ranboo had lowered him down to the floor, 

The two had sat on the edge of the blackstone bridge, Ranboo’s arm wrapped around his shoulder as he talked about the Christmas decorations around the smp. It was…nice. Ranboo was nice as always, and promised to come visit Tommy. And, somehow, Tommy believed him. 

* * *

When Wilbur went to L’Manburg today Tommy follows behind him like always, a normal day if not for one thing—today his daily solitary sit at the portal was a little different. Instead of sitting while leaning on the wall over the lava lake, facing away from the portal, he sits a bit further back, leaning up against the blackstone structure around the portal, still in view of the lake, but so that he has a clearer view of the portal as well. When it started shimmering lightly with the telltale incoming colours of a person, he would be able to see perfectly.

Not that he expected Ranboo to immediately come in the day after he said he’d come visit again but…it would be nice.

“—see! I told you, it works perfectly!” Ranboo’s voice starts to ring out from the portal and Tommy’s head snaps to where he knew his head would appear (6’6 inches off the ground, fuck, he really was half enderman), before another voice rang through.

“I don’t know, Dream said—oh, wait! Look at that!”

Tommy stands up immediately, completely alert and takes a step back, then another, then another, and then he turns on his heel as his best friend (FORMER, former former fo _rmer former_ ) and Ranboo step out of the portal into the nether.

Tommy, one step away from starting his jump down to the ground, stops when he hears something behind him, pounding footsteps, running towards him.

“Tommy!”

He slowly turns back, and there he is.

Tubbo, with his stupid suit and red tie and epaulets is standing there, an arm outstretched towards Tommy. 

Tommy took a sideways glance towards the lava.

“Tommy, I—”

And Tommy starts sprinting, away from the portal, away from the path, away from the lava pool, and away from Tubbo, thin leather shoes pounding on the hard floor of the nether. He threw himself through the Logstead nether portal, back to his tent and onto his bed.

He sits there for a very, very long time.

**Author's Note:**

> might write a sequel?? uhhhh tommy will die in it. do i have a problem with killing off tommyinnit?? follow me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/y9gurt)


End file.
